Sonos Digital Music Systemby Sonos, Inc.
It was a while ago when I decided it was time to find a system that would allow me to digitally catalog and play music from my collection all over my house. I set out to find systems whose price was more than justified by the features it offered and the one that kept catching my attention was Sonos. I've been using Sonos for a month now and I have to say, it's damn near perfect for my needs. There are some key points to Sonos that make it work really well: The whole thing is essentially wireless, it pretty much sets up and maintains itself, it comes with a really nice handheld controller for browsing and controlling playback of my music, and it ties pretty nicely into iTunes, which I use on my computer to import and initially catalog my music. Solving the Storage Issue Sonos doesn't actually store any of your music files, it provides you with a means to view and play them. Although I'm currently storing all my music on the same computer I'm running iTunes on (which works out just fine by the way), I'm going to pick up an inexpensive external “starter” drive to store everything on. I'm considering a LaCie Disk Mini because they have a good reputation, the right price, and you can hook their “Disk Mini” straight up to your network due to its RJ-45 (aka basic network cable) interface. Most external drives have either USB or FireWire interfaces that require them to be hooked up to a computer or some odd network device, but I want access to my music at a whim and don't want to worry about whether or not there's a computer turned off in the other room. Some new routers may support directly hooking up USB drives, so take a look at the options. By using a network attached external drive for storage I only have to manage a single file repository, though you can easily configure Sonos to play music from a number of different drives. It's all a matter of what works best for you. I'm going with a single network attached location because it's hard-wired to the network, which means I won’t have the buffering issues that can come from a wireless storage setup. After setting up Sonos to additionally use music off my laptop, I found my wireless network lacks the required bandwidth performance, because songs coming off the laptop got cut-up so much it would make Funkstörung jealous. This was completely opposite the flawless playback I experienced when the songs came off my wired desktop. How Sonos Works Sonos works through a series of little boxes called Zone Players. I've been using the ZP-80 model which doesn't come with a built-in amp and to get a fix on the size, stack seven standard CD jewel boxes on top of each other; that's almost exactly the size of the ZP-80 box. Having eyeballed the larger, amplified ZP-100 model, put two of those stacks side-by-side and you might be about right for the size of it. Your first Zone Player is the heart of the whole thing, because this one needs to be hard-wired to your network by means of a cable running from your router or modem. After that first wired box though, the whole system goes wireless, easily allowing you to add enough Zone players to cover every room. Setting Zone Players up is pretty simple. All you do is plug one in, go to the "System Settings" menu on the handheld controller (or desktop software) and click "Add a Zone Player" and the screen tells you what to do, which is essentially hold down two buttons on the little box until the blinking light stays on. That's it. At that point the Sonos system has used its own wireless mesh network to enable communication between all your Zone Players. You can even extend the wireless range by spacing out your players. Each one picks up its wireless signal from those nearest, so you can outfit even a ridiculously large house or loft with this system. During initial setup of Sonos they make it really easy to choose where it looks for your music. If you need to add another drive later on, you can. It just takes a few clicks to add any shared folder on your local network. You may have to monkey with your firewall's settings a little, but even that should be a single click for most. The easiest way to set up each additional computer is to install the Sonos desktop software, because that handles a lot of the firewall (and other) settings for you, and gives you yet another place from which to control what’s happening with your Sonos system. The wireless controller is absolutely the coolest thing about the Sonos system (you know besides that music streaming thing it does ;)). You can do nearly everything from the controller, which has a big fat color screen and an iPod styled click-wheel that makes navigation as easy as can be. It's got a rechargeable, internal battery and comes with an AC adapter for charging it, but you can also buy Sonos' rather stylish charging cradle (recommended) as well.
  Bedroom Rockers Where DJs Call Home 
Okay, have you ever wondered what it's like to look at a photo of someones brain? No, not the noodle itself, but the way it thinks. What do you think a book full of photos of DJs brains would look like? Well, wonder no more, because XLR8R Magazine and Adidas Originals have teamed up to bring you "Bedroom Rockers: Where DJs Call Home", a documentary of sorts on the way DJs live, or at least how they were living in the fraction of a second it took photographer Christopher Woodcock to snap a photo. Bedroom Rockers is a nicely done 141 page book of high quality photos taken with a 4x5 Field camera that depicts even the tiniest details. The authors explain that "To make Bedroom Rockers, we knocked on the doors of 97 DJs - from the well-known to the newly minted - in five cities: Portland, Miami, New York, Boston, and Washington D.C." "Photographer Christopher Woodcock went about capturing turntable set-ups and studios in their natural state, while project managers Vivan Host and Brianna Pope quizzed DJs about their music and their dance moves. By shooting people's home environments, we hoped to reflect a more real side of DJ culture, separating it from stardom and taking it back to the basics."
Originally published in December of 2004 (softback, perfect bound), and available free with your purchase from an Adidas Originals store, Bedroom Rockers has been repackaged for 2005 in a more collectible, limited, hardback edition you can buy exclusively at most (if not any) Adidas Originals store.
And did I mention the book comes with a CD? 16-tracks from the likes of DJ Spinna, Spam Allstars, DJ Flack, Deborah Bond, Tallinn 73, Wreck and Systemwide. |
(RE:UP Magazine)
The Little Friends of Printmaking pulled off an incredible cover for RE:UP\'s sixteenth issue. Sure, the figure looks a bit like a sour candy goblin with some menacing choppers, but it\'s flashing a peace sign and bouncing a little ball, so, you know, it\'s all cool. Eff all the others, at this point I\'m ready to cast my Presidential vote for this guy. Maybe this is what the mind of Hunter S. Thompson looks (or respectfully, looked) like? ... read more
(Shook Magazine)
As the end of 2007 saw the demise of the UK's much loved Straight No Chaser, it also introduced us to what is sure to be a new love called Shook. There are no shortage of articles speaking on how this fresh publication is prepared to pick up where SNC left off, or how it's bares similarities to Waxpoetics, but the coverage in Shook has a more varied menu than SNC. In fact, Shook is a lot like the coverage you'll find in the US magazine RE:UP. ... read more
Submit an EventOct 27, 2009 - Featuring Lee Scratch Perry, Subatomic Sound System, Jahdan Blakkamoore, Dubblestandart (plus interview footage with Rusko and live clips of Jahdan with Major Lazer) ... read more
Oct 15, 2009 - Giant Step are pleased to launch the first podcast in a new series called SVEDKA Vodka Future Music Series. The podcasts are hosted by acclaimed London-based DJ, Benji B of Deviation on BBC 1Xtra. Each episode will feature a variety of artists and emerging acts from around the globe, crossing genres from soul and hip hop, to electronica and dubstep, to rock and much more. The best in future sounds, the SVEDKA Vodka Future Music Series presents just-released and unreleased music. ... read more
Oct 08, 2009 - EVENTS TO TAKE PLACE IN MORE THAN 15 CITIES ACROSS THE COUNTRY THROUGHOUT OCTOBER - FREE DOWNLOAD BELOW - Knitting Factory Records, in association with New York-based music and lifestyle marketing company Giant Step, is excited to announce that over 15 official “Felabrations” have been confirmed to take place in more than 15 cities across the country throughout the month of October. ... read more
Oct 03, 2009 - ClashMusic has learned that Bristol trip hop legends Massive Attack are set to work with dubstep producer Burial. ... read more